Visual Novel /
If My Heart Had Wings

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After a knee injury forced him to retire from bicycle racing and his own emotional discomfort made it hard to stay at his old school, Aoi Minase fled back to his home town, both enrolling in the local specialist school and agreeing to act as the caretaker for a girls dorm. There he meets the surly, wheelchair-bound girl Kotori and soon meets up with an old friend of his, Ageha. Together with the bizarre genius girl Amane, they revive the Soaring Club from the brink of death and begin working on constructing and flying a new glider after the partial destruction of the old one before they arrived.

If My Heart Had Wings (originally titled Kono Oozora ni Tsubasa wo Hirogete) is a romance Visual Novel released in 2012 by Pulltop. It has five endings, two of which are unlocked by finishing other routes. It was given an official all-ages English release on 6/28/13 and received a patch to restore censored content a few weeks later. It also has two fandiscs, Kono Oozora ni, Tsubasa wo Hirogete FLIGHT DIARY, which features fanservicey content and extra routes for secondary characters; and Kono Oozora ni, Tsubasa wo Hirogete SNOW PRESENTS, which is a follow-up story focusing on Kotori that happens during winter. A PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita all-ages port titled Kono Oozora ni, Tsubasa wo Hirogete CRUISE SIGN (which is essentially a Game of the Year Edition and includes the base game and the two fandiscs) was also released in March 2016.

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This visual novel provides examples of the following:

The Ace: Yoru is almost as smart as Amane, athletic and has a lot of people that want to be her friend. However, she is somewhat socially withdrawn because she doesn't see any tangible value in interacting with others even when she knows she's lonely.

A-Cup Angst: Kotori has glimpses of this in relation to the other girls, as notable during the club's trip to the beach.

Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: Invoked by Kotori. This is how she wants to be seen. However, not only is she too emotional, but she also lacks dignity AND has a reputation as a crybaby.

Always Someone Better: When Yoru is told that Amane is even smarter than she is, she scoffs and dismisses the idea. When Amane is shown to be genuinely more intelligent, she ruefully admits shes been bested for the first time in her life. In a different route she even gets irritated after she loses despite claiming she didnt care who won beforehand.

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Ascended Extra: Hotaru has her own route in FLIGHT DIARY, Akari has one in the new story added in CRUISE SIGN, and Kanako has one in both.

Isuka always wanted to be the center of attention, though unlike Ma-bou she at least wanted others to think she was great or interesting.

Airplane of Love: Every route's romance is centered on your interaction with the glider.

Bad Liar: The entire Soaring Club is made of terrible liars. They even infected Ma-bou.

Bedmate Reveal: Kanakos route opens with her slowly waking up in an unfamiliar room, naked as she always is when she wakes up and trying to figure out what the soft thing next to her is. After finally remembering why shes in his room, shes still not sure why shes almost naked and tries to figure out if she and Aoi did anything the night before.

Beneath the Mask: Kanako acts all friendly and flirty, but she actually keeps almost everyone at a distance and doesnt like getting involved with their plans or their problems. A little bit into her route she slips up and accidentally plays peacekeeper when Yoru and Asa start fighting. Afterward, she feels meddlesome until Aoi thanks her.

Kanako is the only one of the girls at Aois dorm who can eat all the food he cooks, no matter what it is. For the rest, theres too much, which isnt helped by the fact that it isnt very visually interesting.

Amane eats rather a lot of food, which isnt helped by the fact that she Forgets to Eat regularly, causing her to consume huge amounts of food when she realizes she hasnt eaten in days.

Bleached Underpants: The officially released version cut all the sex scenes, among other things. Also applies to CRUISE SIGN.

"Blind Idiot" Translation: The official release occasionally has some fairly odd or outright wrong translations of what is being said, which ends up making the characters say something completely different than what they meant. This is especially problematic in Ageha's route.

Bokukko: Isuka always used the masculine boku as a student. Given her personality, its probably just trying to be the center of attention.

Book Dumb: Isuka had a lot more common sense than Amane, but was noted to not be terribly bright. This really helped their relationship since with the common sense Amane lacked she could help her feel less isolated, while Amane respected her common sense a great deal and helped her feel smarter in return.

Book-Ends: In the very first scene of the story, Kotori is trapped on a hill by a burst wheelchair tire. With no phone, she writes SOS on a paper airplane and hurls it down to the path at the bottom of the hill, hoping for the best. Aoi finds it, causing their first meeting. During the climax of Kotori's route in the wake of a close call with the glider, Kotori acts as if she has given up on the Soaring Club's dream, allowing her worried family to take her away from the city. Her only indication otherwise was a paper airplane Aoi received through Kotori's sister.

Bowdlerise: The official English release removes dirty humor, sex scenes and an important part of Agehas route since it wasnt exactly family friendly. Notable in that these changes were made specifically for the English release, as there was no Japanese all-ages release to translate from at the time of release until the release of the PS4 and PS Vita ports, CRUISE SIGN, in 2016. This inspired fans to make a restoration patch.

This happens again with the Flight Diary fan-disc, which got an English all-ages release in February 2019, which also featured changes made specifically for this release as there isn't a Japanese all-ages version of fan-disc.

Bromantic Foil: Youd think Ma-bou would fit this, but turns out he actually already has a girlfriend.

Cannot Spit It Out: When she finally realizes that shes not dating Aoi already, Amane repeatedly fails all attempts to tell him the truth.

Asa gets a cold from being out in the rain after she runs away from Aoi since he said she was kind of like a little sister.

After spending all night running around trying to prevent rain damage during a typhoon, Aoi catches a cold.

Caught with Your Pants Down: Twice in Amane's route Aoi accidentally walks in on Amane watching porn, causing him to freak the hell out, and get rather angry the second time as they're dating by that point. Though both times, it's quickly revealed that she's watching for educational purposes, not to masturbate. However, she seems to be pretty into it the second time, at least, and is quite peeved when Aoi demands she stop.

Celibate Hero: Kotori is sure that no one could like a crippled girl and is thus trying to avoid falling for anyone or anything. Even when she gets a love letter disproving that notion and admits that she likes Aoi, she still believes it too strongly to make a move herself.

Tatsuya is rather popular with girls, especially ones older than him. It apparently increases in age until elderly women are fawning all over him.

Aoi has girls asking (indirectly) for his number the first day he shows up, has multiple love interests getting attached to him quickly and has first year girls trying to flirt with him later on.

On the other side of things, Ageha is noted to be very, very popular with boys. The other girls are emphasized as being cute as well, but Ageha is the one that gets the most attention.

On the female side, once Amane graduates and starts working as an inventor her number of suitors skyrockets since she isnt surrounded by people too intimidated to talk to her.

Kotori is also said to have been very, very popular before her accident, due mainly to her stunning looks. After, however, everyone was too busy pitying her and acting sad about her injury, causing her to become withdrawn and bitter. She admits she didn't really take advantage of it at the time because she didn't realise it would end, and was at times very disappointed that she never did.

Childhood Friends: Aoi, Ageha, Mabou, Tatsuya, Hotaru and a few miscellaneous, unimportant characters all used to hang out as kids. Aoi remembers Hotaru as just sort of following them at a distance, however, rather than playing with them.

Clingy Jealous Girl: Ageha tries not to let it show, but she tends to get jealous when she feels that someone is getting closer to Aoi than she is. During her route, it gets worse.

Club Stub: The Soaring Club is on the verge of being disbanded at the start of the story. Not only does it have only a single member, but it takes up a large garage area and produces essentially no results. Kotori, Ageha and Aoi join early in the common route and get it up to barely being of sufficient size to continue, but thats still only four members. Kanako is not accepted as a member of the Soaring Club by Akari because she knows that Kanako will quickly get bored and cease to be a real participant, which isnt fair to the real clubs that want to use the garage.

Cool Big Sis: Kanako does her best to make Asa and Yoru feel at home in the dorm and even compares herself to their big sister.

About the only thing Amane can do with her hands is draw schematics. After the wings snapped on her first test flight, she couldnt even tell that she had assembled the glider clumsily, so Ageha takes over when it comes to construction.

Asa isnt quite as bad as Amane when it comes to dexterity, but she lives in the highly talented Yorus shadow, which makes her feel clumsier than she is.

Cuteness Proximity: Asa and Yoru both go gaga over animals. For Asa, its dog and for Yoru its cats.

The Cutie: Asa tends to be much cutesier than her sister and is subsequently significantly more popular than her, having both more friends and more suitors. It's one of the few things she can actually beat Yoru in, which is helped by Yoru's asocial nature.

The Day the Music Lied: Right in the middle of triumphant, upbeat music during the first Morning Glory flight, Amane and Aoi hit a dead spot over the lake and nearly crash. They lose too much altitude to succeed in getting about the clouds.

Demoted to Extra: Ageha, Asa, and Yoru were reduced to side-characters in FLIGHT DIARY and the additional story added in CRUISE SIGN.

Deuteragonist: Kanako narrates large portions of her own route, generally when she has to take care of something that Aoi cant like negotiating peace between Asa and Yoru.

Diabolus ex Machina: If the glider is flying and it isn't the end of a route, expect something to happen to prevent it from flying.

Didn't Think This Through: To get back at Asa for going to her club meeting instead of hanging out with her, Yoru steals her favorite underwear, puts it on and sends a picture to Asa, forgetting that Aoi and the other club members would be there to see it as well when the picture arrived. Woops.

Different as Night and Day: Fittingly, the twins are named Asa and Yoru, or Morning and Night. Go on, guess what their personalities are like. They also always have different values and like different things. Apart from Aoi, that is.

Digging Yourself Deeper: Kotori tries to claim shes a cool beauty, but mispronounces the word and then tries to backpedal, even going so far as begging for a reintroduction. All she manages to do is absolutely destroy the dignified, rich girl atmosphere she had presented during their first meeting.

Disability as an Excuse for Jerkassery: Kotori can get away with a lot since people are concerned about her. Nobody else would be able to get the leeway she does socially. Later, after she mellows, even she admits herself that she was pretty insufferable.

Disabled Love Interest: Kotori lost the use of her legs in a balloon accident two years ago. The resulting social problems made her move to another school and at the start of the story shes about to drop out of that one too. Shes also a little lonely since she used to be popular before she lost her legs since she assumes that nobody will look at her like that anymore.

Dismotivation: Yoru tries not to do too much better than Asa. For example, she can read her sister perfectly and thus predict what shell do in any round of rock paper scissors, but will instead always throw out the same hand since to lose is annoying and to win would make her sister sad.

Ditzy Genius: Amane is brilliant, but shes also incredibly clumsy, slow paced, forgets to eat and is building a glider despite being afraid of heights.

Does Not Like Men: The dorm girls apart from Kanako arent used to dealing with guys at the beginning of the story and are really awkward and even fearful.

Don't You Dare Pity Me!: Kotori has some issues along this line, but for the most part she avoids the subject and even knows shes exaggerating what people are thinking.

Dude, She's Like, in a Coma!: In Amanes route she cant bring herself to tell Aoi how she feels, but she can kiss him when she thinks hes asleep.

Epic Fail: After Aoi confesses to Amane she says I understand and then goes on her merry way without giving an update for about a year. She gets asked by the other girls about whether or not she has a boyfriend and she says Sure, of course. Except since she didnt talk to Aoi for a year, shes the only one that thinks theyre dating and everyone is completely baffled as to how she could have made a mistake. In an attempt to rectify her error, she compliments him on his cooking, causing an exasperated Kotori to call her useless. Building on that just gets worse.

Evolving Title Screen: Once all routes have been completed, the title screen changes to a shot of the Morning Glory and plays the eponymous BGM.

Expospeak Gag: Rather than saying something simple like eating, Amane refers to lunch as calorie intake. Its not even like she views it as a task to get through, making the mechanical way of referring to it a touch odd.

Not only does Kanako tease Aoi with flirting, but she also directs Amane to porn sites when she gets confused about how dating works.

Unsure of what exactly happened between between her and Aoi the night he caught a cold, Kanako makes the fatal mistake of consulting Yoru to see whether one can tell if theyre still a virgin or not. The next morning, Yoru wakes up early to makes sekihan, which is generally only served at celebrations. Like becoming an adult.

Gender-Blender Name: Either way of reading Aois name is typically more used for girls than boys.

Similarly the owner of Flying Fish Manor and the former Soaring Club member who owns the runway never show up despite being occasionally somewhat important to the plot. Aoi's mother is a borderline case in that she never appears but is heard on the phone.

Girlish Pigtails: Asa and Yoru, who are as young as half Amanes age, both sport long twintails.

The Glasses Gotta Go: Isuka thought Amane looked much better without glasses, so she stole them, hid them and made her use contacts instead. In the present, Amane is still under the impression that she just lost her glasses and continues wearing contacts.

Graceful Loser: After making sure that Aoi does like Kotori, Ageha does her best to help her and Aoi get together.

Gratuitous English: Quite a bit. Ageha is a frequent offender, with lines such as "Ranwe izu crea!"note The runway is clear (copied at times by Asa and Yoru). Yoru has dropped a few on occasion as well. Asa and Yoru's grandfather's catchphrase is the butchered "Notin goldo kan stay"note Nothing gold can stay. Kotori at one point drops the gem "My name is Kotori. I am a Kotori!"note Kotori means tiny bird in Japanese.

Hair Color Dissonance: Given the otherwise largely normal or at least possible hair colors, Kotori and Agehas hair are probably supposed to be black and brown respectively, not purple and pinkish red.

Hair Decorations: The most reliable way to tell Yoru and Asa apart visually is their hair decorations. Asa has green ribbons and Yoru has small flowers.

The Heart: Being a Nice Guy who tries to do his best for everyone and make them get along, Aoi tends to be the center of the group.

Heroic BSoD: When Amane gets the last letter Isuka wrote to her, she flips out and attempts to destroy the glider. Isukas letter was about how she never really thought it would be possible for them to reach the Morning Glory and has been lying to her. She calms down soon enough, but briefly gives up on the whole thing entirely until its explained why Isuka would say that.

All of the main characters except Yoru get one of these on one route or another. Kotori gives up on her dream of flying after her father intends to take her away at the climax of her route, on Ageha's route she had one in the past after Aoi moved away and their "secret base" was going to be demolished, Asa has a brief one on the lead up to her and Yoru's routes after she think's Aoi sees her only as a little sister and Aoi himself experiences this on Yoru's route after the glider is accidentally damaged during his flight and he thinks that they can no longer try for the Morning Glory.

Heroic Self-Deprecation: Amane proudly states that shes an idiot on occasion. Shes actually pleased that she has no common sense since it helps her feel less superior and distant from everyone else. She shows little pride or even notice of her inventions and instead feels smug over minor things like becoming a teacher despite admitting shell be completely terrible at it.

She also never uses Yorus name, preferring to call her the younger Kazato sister instead.

Hidden Buxom: All of the girls seem to go up a cup size or two when naked in the CGs as opposed to their fully clothed sprites, even the already impressively endowed Ageha and Amane.

Hollywood Nerd: Amane is an antisocial nerd, but shes generally viewed as the most beautiful member of the cast despite taking no care of her appearance whatsoever.

Hopeless Suitor: After his girlfriend Eri breaks up with him offscreen, Ma-bou goes for Akari, but shes both unimpressed and already likes Aoi.

How We Got Here: Kanakos route opens with her and Aoi naked in bed together before she wakes up and tries to remember what happened yesterday. After thinking things through, she still cant remember why shes naked.

If You Ever Do Anything to Hurt Her...: When Aoi stumbles and accidentally reveals his relationship with both Yoru and Asa to their grandfather, his reaction is basically Fine, Ill overlook this for now, but if you upset them then I will crush you. Since their grandfather is Chairman of their Academy's board of directors, and a wealthy, local celebrity, the threat only gets graver.

Ill Girl: Isuka was sickly and prone to fevers. After the accident her illness played up and she nearly died. After is, she confined herself to a recovery room since she didnt have much to live for anyway so her health didnt improve.

Improbable Age: Amane manages to be both improbably old and improbably young at the same time.

First, shes improbably old for a change of pace from the normal. Namely, shes made the school repeat her several times and is thus in her early to mid 20s yet still apparently a high school student. Or the equivalent, anyway, since the school is a bit quirky in that respect.

On the other hand, shes already a wealthy and accomplished inventor with a lot of respect. Whenever club funds run out, she finances the project with her own money with a clear attitude of spending inconsequential amounts of money.

Incest Subtext: On Yoru's route both her and her sister Asa engage in a romantic and, fairly quickly, sexual relationship with Aoi. When they ultimately decide to have sex with him at the same time the twins seem almost as aroused by each other as their joint boyfriend.

Indirect Kiss: Ageha shares her ice cream with Aoi early and calls it the Cookie & Cream & Ageha Indirect Kiss flavor. Aoi ignores her as best he can.

Info Dump: The story occasionally slows to a crawl while someone talks about gliders and the mechanics of flying.

Informed Attractiveness: Amane is considered the most beautiful of the girls in the club. Kotori and Ageha are sure that they couldnt compete with her for Aoi if she wanted him.

When Kotori opens up a little bit, she still doesnt really know how she should be treating people if she doesnt want them to hate her and can still end up being on the rude side.

Amane has no idea how relationships work, so when Aoi confesses and she responds Yeah, I understand she assumes theyre dating, but doesnt talk to him or meet with him for a year, leaving him to feel his love is unrequited. Kanako has to sort out all the problems here after the Soaring Club members are too stunned at this to respond properly.

Before meeting Isuka and being told that she was dumb for thinking there was a single right answer for everything, Amane lived in a socially isolated world that she describes as completely colorless and dull.

Yoru has a similar issue. If she cant see the material value in doing something, she wont do it. This leaves her pretty lonely, though she doesnt fully realize it.

Is It Something You Eat?: After Kotori dropped her withdrawal notice, Aoi found it and hid it. Whenever she asks him about it, he pretends to have no idea what shes talking about. When he refers to it directly and she points it out, he asks if its something he can cook with or eat.

It's All My Fault: In Yorus route, Aoi takes the plane for another test flight and the cable detaches prematurely, causing a crash landing that destroys the wing. Though its not really his fault in any way, hes really broken up about it until the twins step in to make building a new wing in time possible.

Jerkass: Mr. Tobioka has a grudge against Amane for almost making the Robotics Club a national icon, but screwing up at the last second and abandoning the club shortly after. Since then the Robotics Club, while popular, has failed to recapture the glory it had when Amane was part of it. Because of this, Mr. Tobioka has spent years trying to dismantle the Soaring Club, and interferes with its events. In truth, hes genuinely concerned for their safety after Isukas accident. His grudge against Amane also has essentially nothing to do with the Robotics Club after all except in that it makes her look somewhat irresponsible.

Jerkass Has a Point: Tobioka is legitimately concerned about the safety of the Soaring Club members. Hes not being malicious, he knows that what theyre doing is actually quite dangerous. When the club has accidents in Kotori and Yorus routes or nearly plummets to the ground during the common route with the first Morning Glory, its easy to see his point. However, his methods of stopping the Soaring Club, such as intimidation of supportive or on-the-fence faculty members, pressuring pro-Soaring Club students, and outright sabotage of the club's equipment (to be fair, it was never proven) is far from reasonable.

Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Yoru is grumpy and sarcastic, but she also cares a lot for her sister and always goes out of her way to take care of her.

Ladykiller in Love: Downplayed. Tatsuya is extremely popular and used to receiving confessions, but doesnt know how to give one himself when Isuka returns.

Lamarck Was Right: Despite her clumsiness, Amane is a skilled inventor. She inherited her acumen from her father, who's an inventor himself.

Lap Pillow: When Aoi gets really tired during the early portion of Amanes route, he falls asleep in the garage. Amane moves him into her lap while hes asleep, confusing him when he wakes up.

Even when Kanako tries to cook a simple dish for a sick person, she ends up burning it and somehow making it salty and spicy. Well, the spiciness is probably to be expected given that she tried adding in Tabasco sauce. Later, she tries copying what she saw Aoi doing. We can see the disaster slowly unfold as it becomes clear that Kanako is both too inventive and inattentive. It actually does end up almost edible, though, prompting Aoi to help her cook something thats actually quite good.

Asa is completely hopeless when it comes to cooking. She buys the wrong ingredients and tries to wash vegetables with detergent. After that much, people tend to step in to stop things from getting even worse. During the twins route, she improves quickly. It's hinted that she never really tried to learn how to do it properly.

Like Brother and Sister: Subverted. Aoi says that Asa is sort of like a little sister, which she takes literally. He really just meant that hes protective of her.

Lonely at the Top: Amane and Yoru are both socially isolated due to their intelligence, the former moreso than the latter. While Yoru rejects the companionship of people apart from her sister, Amane hasnt the slightest idea how to get along with people and didnt have a single friend until high school.

Love Triangle: Isuka, Amane and Tatsuya made for an odd little triangle back in their day. Isuka and Tatsuya liked each other and Tatsuya was invited to the club solely for that reason, but he felt he couldnt compete with Isuka and Amanes friendship and the relationship didnt go anywhere. In Amanes route, the four go on a group date at the end offscreen.

Making Love in All the Wrong Places: Pretty much all of the routes involve this to some extent, with the shared bath in the dorm, a beach and the Soaring Club's two headquarters being favourite spots for Aoi and his chosen Love Interest. However the queen of this trope is Ageha. Three (or four depending on how you count it) sex scenes in the game, not a one of them in a bed.

Manic Pixie Dream Girl: Gender inverted. Aoi is bright and friendly, if perhaps nervous around girls, and helps the sullen and temperamental Kotori to open.

The same applies to Aoi's relationship with Yoru, though in that case only really if her route is chosen.

The Matchmaker: Kotori plays matchmaker for Amane and Aoi while Ageha does the same for Kotori and Aoi in the previous route.

Marry Them All: Theres an unlockable threesome ending with Asa and Yoru where Aoi cant choose between them and Yoru suggests choosing both of them. Though its a route that includes both of them, it focuses on Yoru since Asa got her development in the previous route.

Measuring the Marigolds: When Twin B offers to explain how the glider just pulled off a stunt, Twin A doesnt want to hear about it since she thinks it cant really explain the wonder. Twin B scoffs and says without theories of lift the glider wouldnt have worked in the first place. Considering the amount of time the story has spent talking about how gliders work, it probably sides with her.

Multiple Endings: There are routes for Amane, Ageha and Kotori, as well as one for Asa and one that is technically for both of the twins but really about Yoru.

New Transfer Student: Aoi transfers into a new school at the beginning and quite the spectacle is made of it. Hes instantly popular with girls, though he doesnt notice.

Nice Girl: Ageha is noted to be very friendly and popular despite being a little tomboyish.

Nice Guy: Aoi is quiet, mellow and tends to act as the emotional core of the group with his supportive personality.

No Social Skills: Amane has little idea how to interact with people, though shes better than she used to be.

Oblivious to Love: Aoi is pretty poor at picking up on the feelings of girls. He doesnt notice the first year girls that like him, is blind to Ageha and completely overlooks Kotori. To be fair, though, Kotori is pretty heavily trying not to think about such things. But its not his fault regarding Amane. So far as hes concerned, she rejected him even apart from all her awkwardness.

Odd Friendship: The prickly, stern and straight laced student council member Akari is best friends with the spacy, irresponsible and flirt Kanako.

The Ojou: The Kazato sisters are the granddaughters of the board chairman and quite wealthy. Theyre a bit sick of getting the ojou treatment, though.

Omniglot: Hibari speaks at least four languages fluently and more likely five counting English. She studies them as a hobby and is about the same age as Amane.

One Degree of Separation: Ageha and Aoi are childhood friends of Tatsuya, who was in the soaring club with Amane. Amanes best friend and motivation is/was Isuka, who left a diary that Kotori found and inspired her to do flying practice. Aois mother is a friend of Asa and Yorus grandfather, so they move into his dorm and join the club. Asa and Yoru are acquainted with Isuka, who was Secretly Wealthy.

One of the Boys: Ageha was apparently really boyish when she was younger. When Aoi told her that, she resolved to be more girly.

One of the Kids: Amane is somewhere in her middle 20s but poorly socialized. As a result, her maturity is often outshone by the likes of Aoi, something that eventually comes to bother her a little. After Asa and Yoru join, shes noted to be twice their age.

Only Friend: Isuka and Amane were each others only friends and very close. Before they met, Amane was living in a colorless world and Isuka was moody and distant. Tatsuya was eventually invited to the club as well, but mostly because Isuka had an obvious crush on him. He felt the same way, but also didnt think he could get between Amane and Isuka. Since he wasnt too involved he and Amane drifted apart after Isuka disappeared.

Out of Focus: Amane largely disappears from the story in the twins route. Kanako and Ageha stay on, but a lot of their role is taken over by Kanako of all people.

Overshadowed by Awesome: Everyone in the Kazato family is amazingly talented apart from Asa, who is merely average.

Parental Abandonment: Everyone lives in a boarding house, so their parents never come into things much. Aoi and Agehas mothers have a few lines and Kotoris father appears during her route, but thats about it.

Parents as People: Kotori's father. He and her mother tried to be supportive of her after her accident but couldn't help being depressed over it, causing her to be depressed that she was depressing them. This vicious cycle got so bad she moved out to a boarding school just to get away. At the climax of her route Kotori's father tries to take her away from her friends, boyfriend and dream of flying, even saying that she can't achieve her dreams like normal people. However he only does this due to being terrified after she was hurt in an accident involving the glider. Once he sees how passionate she is about flying he relents.

Platonic Life-Partners: Isuka and Amane were so close that Tatsuya felt he couldnt compete with the latter for Isukas attention even though Isuka liked him just as much.

Polyamory: On Yoru's route she and Asa both fall in love with Aoi and he returns both their feelings. As such Yoru decides the only logical solution is for the twins to share him.

Porn with Plot: In the original release & patched version of the localization.

Posthumous Character: Isuka, Amanes friend who helped get her involved in the Soaring Club to begin with, is implied to be dead from the start. She actually simply disappeared. Neither Amane nor Tatsuya know what happened to her.

Real Men Wear Pink: Aoi is quite good at cleaning and cooking and took over managing the Flying Fish Manor dorm after the previous dorm mother was injured.

Reasonable Authority Figure: Akari is initially somewhat antagonistic by nearly disbanding the Soaring Club, but shes just doing her job when other Club Stubs arent being recognized and dont take up nearly the amount of space. When they get more members, she is perfectly willing to help them out and stand up for them to the best of her ability.

Rose-Haired Sweetie: Her hair is a little darker than normal for the trope, but Ageha is definitely the most outgoing, energetic and passionate of the girls on the surface at least.

Sempai/Kohai: Aoi's relationship with Asa and Yoru, whether romantic or otherwise. This is supposed to be Amane's relationship with all the other club members, at least in their minds, but her eccentricities tend to erode her authority too much.

Shameless Fanservice Girl: Kanako wanders around in her underwear when it gets hot, which makes a lot of people uncomfortable. After her mother remarried some guy with a son approximately Kanakos own age, her mother made her live in the dorms since she refused to stop wandering around the house half dressed.

She Is All Grown Up: Ageha used to be rather boyish, so now that shes girly and cute Aoi is quite surprised and tries to deny admitting it.

Hotaru has a crush on Aoi like her sister, but you can see her early on clearly refusing to even risk getting in the way by joining the Soaring Club. Later in Agehas route, competition with Hotaru is the thing that genuinely makes Ageha nervous rather than Amane or Kanako. Summed up in a scene where everyone is eating, and Aoi seated in between Hotaru and Ageha, with both sisters competing for his attention. Even if it is a staged photoshoot just to raise club funds, the tension is real.

Asa and Yoru share a route, so as you can guess their relationship with each other and Aoi gets pretty complicated. Aoi either picks Asa or, after you finish the Asa route, cannot choose between them.

Sick Episode: After Aoi catches a cold from running around during a typhoon, Kanako spends the day taking care of him. By the end of the day, shes so tired that she basically falls asleep on top of him and cant remember why shes rather lacking in clothing the next morning.

Slapstick Knows No Gender: Kotori is frequently chopped early on by Aoi when she starts acting bratty and she eventually gives permission to Ageha to do the same if she starts acting up again.

Akari is a bit cold and distant, but shes only trying to do her job and once she sees that the club is doing activities properly she even helps a little. She even develops a little crush on Aoi early on.

Yoru likes to act cool and distant in contrast to her sister, but really loves her sister and would do anything for her. Later, she also begins opening up to Aoi as well.

Supreme Chef: Aoi and Yoru are both really good at cooking, though to Aois frustration hes not used to cooking for girls and cant quite suit their tastes all the time.

Switching P.O.V.: Occasionally, the focus will shift from Aoi to another character, normally to see conversations he's not involved in.

The Tease: Kanako really likes flirting with Aoi since she knows hes too straightlaced to do anything. There are a few hints in the twins routes that she might be more serious about it than she acts, or at least might actually like him.

Theme Naming: Several things, as well as all of the main characters and several side characters have names related to the sky, flight, and/or the weather.

The name of the town, "Kazegaura", means something like "windy shore".

The school's name, "Keifū", means "light wind".

The big shopping mall is named "Windy".

The bridge across the lake is named "Sazanami" ("ripple") and meanders like a wave.

Aoi: meant to be the color of the sky, although it's actually jade. This comes up a couple of times. When explaining learning why his father gave him this name, he says he was disappointed to find out it's actually blue-green. His surname, "Minase", means "water rapids".

Kotori: "little bird". In her route, she is compared to a bird being kept in a cage, whose feathers have been cut. In the twins' routes, Yoru nicknames her "Tori" ("bird") just to tease her. Habane: "sound of feathers".

Ageha: a short form of "agehachō", the swallowtail butterfly. She wears a butterfly-shaped ribbon in her hair, and in one case, signs a note with a symbol resembling a butterfly.

Isuka: red crossbill. Her bangs cross over in the middle, like the beak of that bird. Misagi: "beautiful heron/egret".

Hibari: skylark.

Hotaru: firefly.

Shigure (Kanako's surname): a seasonal rain shower.

Kumoi (Akari's surname): "dwelling in clouds".

Even the BGM gets in on this, with tracks alluding to the names of the heroines: "dreamin' little bird" (Kotori), "Cheerful butterfly" (Ageha), "Sky Sound" (Amane), "Brightening Way" (Asa), and "Evening talk" (Yoru).

Thinks Like a Romance Novel: In the official English release, Amane has no experience with romance, so she starts studying romantic films. A baffled Aoi gets irritated when she tries to imitate the scenes, offended that after she rejected him, she could be so insensitive. The scene in the original 18+ version of the game is more risqué, justifying Aois irritation. As revealed in the 18+ restoration patch, she's watching porn to learn more about sex.

Throwing Off the Disability: In Kotoris ending shes encouraged to get a risky surgery to fix her legs. Its successful, but even so it only restores partial functionality.

Ageha: ''"All preparations are complete. Fly, as if your heart had wings. So go and fly! That's an order!"

Amane's route drops the original Japanese title. It's the final line in her epilogue — translated as, "In this vast sky, they spread their wings" — as part of a closing monologue by her. This can qualify as a Finale Title Drop if you read her route last.

Tomboy: Ageha is said to be boyish, but apart from her speech patterns shes pretty girly.

Kotori is the defrosting ice queen type of tsundere for the most part, but even after that shes still not very honest with her feelings.

Ma-bou is enough of a blatant, cliché tsundere for Aoi that Kotori wonders if he might be competition.

Twice Shy: Kotori and Aoi both admit they like each other to Ageha, but to her frustration they dance around the issue forever despite their clear intimacy.

Twin Switch: Invoked. Kanako suggests that Asa and Yoru switch places to see if they can pull it off and help them with their anxiety. Unusually, they suck at it. However, they're able to keep it going for most of the day with people only thinking that they're acting a little odd today.

Twin Threesome Fantasy: Asa and Yoru share a route after clearing Asa separately. A lot of Aois friend and classmates are jealous or think it somewhat scandalous, but it was their idea, not his.

Unkempt Beauty: Amane takes almost no care of her appearance and sleeps at a desk rather than a bed, but despite that shes viewed by the rest of the girls as easily being the most attractive.

Unrequited Love Switcheroo: Aoi confessed to Ageha when they were younger, but she turned him down. During the main story, she clearly has a crush on him while he has no particular attraction to her.

W.A.F.F.: The story is very light and undramatic for the most part. The stakes are low, theres little emotional upheaval and nothing permanently bad really happens.

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